BOFH: We're an industry leader … in employing idiot managers
- Reference: 1668771013
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2022/11/18/bofh_2022_episode_22/
- Source link:
I don't know who the Boss has been talking to, but it sounds like he's drunk the Kool-Aid, had a couple of Kool-Aid ice blocks and ordered a Kool-Aid take-home six pack.
"What are we talking about?" the PFY asks.
[1]
"We're going to refurbish the building!" he burbles happily. "They're going to completely replace all the old fit-out with new fit-out based around energy efficiency, low carbon impact and alternative energy sources."
[2]
[3]
"Who's they?" I ask.
"The Company. Apparently the board voted for it unanimously! We're going to be an industry leader."
[4]
I stop short of mentioning that we're already an industry leader in employing idiots in management positions, and decide to ask further questions.
"Is this the same board that said we should issue fan heaters rather than fixing the air conditioning?"
"I don't know about that," the Boss replies.
[5]
"Sure you do," the PFY says. "They'd have installed a coal-burning furnace for night-time heating if they thought they'd get away with it."
"I think you might be …"
"No, no, he's right," I interrupt. "This place would cheerfully roast dolphins over a dumpster full of burning crude oil if there was money in it."
"Well they've changed," the Boss snaps back.
Like hell. Our board is less likely to change than a basement-dwelling Linux geek with only three days on his t-shirt. The only reason they'd want to go Green is because there's money in it.
"What are they proposing?" I ask.
"LED lighting," the Boss offers.
"Already got it," the PFY says. "It was almost all replaced a couple of years back when several fluoro fittings caught fire."
"Solar water heating."
"Go that too. It preheats all the water to our on-demand water system – which we installed a year ago after the gas boiler caught fire."
"What about double glazing? We haven't got that!" the Boss snaps back.
"True," I say. "but only because neither PFY nor I have worked out a way to set glass on fire. We did get a partially green roof – after setting some of the old HVAC plant on fire six months ago."
"What?!"
"We realized that fire is a great motivator – particularly if the board are meeting in the building when the alarms go off. So over the past few years we've managed to get the crappy aircon replaced, the lights upgraded and the gas boiler removed from the roof."
"You've … been setting fire to things?" he gasps.
"Some didn't need all that much help," the PFY explains. "That boiler dated back to the Ark and was a ticking timebomb. We just gave it a nudge. But that still doesn't explain why the board would be proactively considering going green. Are we about to be fined?"
"I … uh … no …"
"Will there be a new energy levy?" I ask.
"I don't think so."
"Are they offering money?" the PFY asks astutely.
The Boss is silent.
"So someone's offering us money to get greener?" the PFY says. "Is it the government?"
"I couldn't possibly comm—"
"It's the Government then," I jump in. "Only they're not publicizing it. Is this a pilot scheme which they're only offering to certain businesses?"
"I …"
"A pilot scheme they're only offering to certain businesses … which no-one wants to talk about. Is there an NDA?"
"I don't know what you're tal—"
"So there's an NDA! Don't tell me: it's a pilot scheme to green up a company which they'll use as a shining example of their commitment to the environment – just prior to the next elections. Unless , of course, it's a complete pig's breakfast – in which case they'd be reminding us of that NDA …"
The Boss's disappointment is offset somewhat by his astonishment at my apparent reading of his mind (and not just his email).
"I …"
"I'm assuming that the money for all this work will supplied as some form of 'loan' which will be written off as a PR expenditure if we're successful?"
"I don't …"
"Which in turn means there will be some measurable Green criteria we have to meet? Maybe a reduction in overall energy consumption? A move towards carbon neutrality?"
"Both those criteria have been suggested," the Boss admits, conceding defeat. "The money would be supplied as a seed fund, with the balance of our costs being reimbursed when it was proven."
"In a couple of years?" the PFY asks.
"Yes."
"In a new tax year?" I ask, as the PFY wanders off.
"I guess so."
"After we'd claimed a rebate on the Green upgrades in this tax year?"
"I suppose so."
"So it would really be a massive injection of cash?"
"You … could call it that."
[6]BOFH : You brought nothing to the party but a six-pack of regret
[7]BOFH : When was the last time someone said these exact words to you: You are the sunshine of my life?
[8]BOFH : But I did log in to the portal, Dave
[9]BOFH : Buttock And Departmental Defence ... As A Service
"Cash which would be evenly shared with those in the Company who have helped the Company reduce its greenhouse gas emissions?"
"I think it would be fairly hard to prove …" >jangle< "What the hell's that?"
"Oh I suspect that's the PFY with a tin of petrol – upgrading the Company's fleet vehicles to EVs …"
You've got to know how to motivate people.
[10]BOFH: The whole shebang
[11]The Compleat BOFH Archives 95-99
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[6] https://www.theregister.com/2020/01/10/bofh_2020_episode_1/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2020/01/24/bofh_2020_episode_2/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2018/05/04/bofh_2018_episode_8/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2018/01/12/bofh_2018_episode_1/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/data_centre/bofh/
[11] http://www.bofharchive.com/
[12] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Old and tried methods
Something breaks then it might take a long time to fix and not as reliable as a new one. Ah yes been there. I will not say what I did.
Re: Old and tried methods
Some one said, the best time to plan to replace it is when it is working and due to be replaced. This gives you 3 months for the paper work to go through. If you wait till it breaks, you do not know what you will get (second hand?) and disruption during the emergency.
"Oh I suspect that's the PFY with a tin of petrol – upgrading the Company's fleet vehicles to EVs …"
Nice! EV's are susceptible to battery fires... I think the Boss may find his allocated company EV getting a lot toasty in the near future...
You can also, allegedly, disable them remotely. You know, out with mistress IT trainer and the car suddenly slows to a stop and the doors remain locked and a notification appears: you have five minutes to approve the emergency IT budget…
"What about double glazing? We haven't got that!"
The proper -not published or spoken- response is: It is harder to throw people through both glass panes in one go.
They should have tested this thesis...
Actually you just need to make sure the frames are of the 'open outward and turn so outside can be cleaned from inside' variety.
Have to think about the safety of the cleaners, nothing to do with that window's ability to open wide enough to allow an office chair to exit gracefully........ It might be on fire and need to be 'removed' from the office....
What's that "double glaze" you are talking about? That went out of fashion around the K/T transition....
Shut up already!
The Boss's disappointment is offset somewhat by his astonishment at my apparent reading of his mind (*and not just his email).
You're breaking your NDA, stop giving our *operational secrets away!!
Re: Shut up already!
Not really, he's just seeing the Boss' Outlook on all those Exchanges...
Re: Shut up already!
What good does it make if you know the secrets ... but still have to take Circle Line back home?
Re: Shut up already!
Sometimes this is not even required. As in a former life when I learnt about the company being sold. There was a non-private appointment in the boss' calendar which took place off-site and involved the CEO, CFO, L&C, and a law firm specialised in M&A... (And yes, my access to that calendar was licit)
Re: Shut up already!
Or the department at a previous employer which found out they were getting outsourced because someone had to approve the large purchase order to $OUTSOURCING_CO for the outsourcing of $DEPARTMENT...
Re: Shut up already!
You basically have to have access, because of the smooth running of the system and whatnot.
Now reading mails is one thing. The BOFH once remarked he had a script to send some nasty mail and delete itself and stuff...
Industry Leaders
I stop short of mentioning that we're already an industry leader in employing idiots in management positions
Surely very much second in that regard to a certain blue chicken coop.
Re: Industry Leaders
The fox in the henhouse is creating even more carnage than expected.
Re: Industry Leaders
Fox? More like a stoned badger.
Re: Industry Leaders
*Definitely* not stoned. Possibly bombed on amphetamines, possibly very, very angry, possibly both. But absolutely not stoned.
Re: Stoned Badger
I've not seen one stoned.
But I have seen a whole set drunk after eating rotting Apples.
They had two states: nearly asleep and fighting.
I only found them due to the noise they were making.
Re: Stoned Badger
I've worked with some support teams like that...…...
Re: Industry Leaders
Do you think one of those/a series of those oft vaunted, phantom-like entrepreneurial government grants, to kickstart a moribund and intellectually bankrupt Cabinet executive with the supply and maintenance of a wealth of narrative energising novel ideas and virtually ACTive developments, would be made silently available ie irretrievably paid from targeted flush flash slush funds, to the likes of a FOSS program grandstanding ground-breaking and Earth shattering projects to be shared and reported on in the likes of a Situation Publishing forum for MkUltra High Tech Echo Chamber Applications Realising All Manner of Proposed and Otherworldly Plans for a Great Reset Exercising Powerful Lead with Immaculately Resourced Energies via Greater IntelAIgent IT GamePlay ..... and against which any competition rather than support would be liable to be recognised and treated as hostile opposition and be subject to unrelenting attack for crushing defeat on their defences ‽
And that would have every chance of being Almighty AWEsome too .... and have UKGBNI MoDified Forces to the fore and able to exercise lead with some practical leverage in a vanguard engine rather than as is of now, their settling for the cold comfort of rotten cuckolded dessert reserved for squatting residents of the caboose.
J'accuse .... and suggest the stealthy noble engagement of such as be touted as certainly novel and readily available greater alternatives to present calamitous bankrupting stock options.
After all, it is not as if the system does not have tens and hundreds and thousands of billions to play with and disburse, in the hope that there must be something which works indecently well and excessively to their home advantage and also curry foreign and alien favour.
Re: Industry Leaders
You really should go into politics.
Well, anywhere really, so long as it's not IT
Re: Industry Leaders
That's more idiot being given money by other idiots to manage a company
"Tin" of petrol?
Where are you from? I'm curious.
Re: "Tin" of petrol?
Apparently, 1930 or thereabouts. The author is a Kiwi IIRC, which may or may not explain the usage.
Well
After the PFY's keyboard died mysteriously earlier today*
I'm pretty sure the BoFH is setting his whole office building up to be greenified........**
We had the lights changed to 'high efficiency, low cost ones'
I was'nt very popular when I pointed out with the power saved we could run the 2 compressors for an extra 5 mins per day...
*shes somehow managed to aquire the other chair in the office... possibly a black market deal with one of the senior programmers....I'm making sure the new carpet is nailed down and checking the lift when I use it so that its there when the doors open......
**after being purified by fire of course
"neither PFY nor I have worked out a way to set glass on fire"
Try chlorine tri-fluoride.
https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/sand-won-t-save-you-time
It's just not the same. BOFH story is still amazing but it's not same.
"Oh I suspect that's the PFY with a tin of petrol – upgrading the Company's fleet vehicles to EVs …"
BOFH 1. Keyboard 0.
BOFH now goes forward to the Regurgitated Half Masticated Cheese Sandwich Cup
Nice screen layout
This was displayed on my screen under the "FTX disarray declared 'unprecedented' by exec who cleaned up after Enron" which pictured a dumpster fire... Possible "Green Upgrade"?